


The Care and Keeping of Stowaways

by SnailArmy



Category: The Mechanisms (Band)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-01
Updated: 2020-07-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:53:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25019590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SnailArmy/pseuds/SnailArmy
Summary: If you find your ship in possession of stowaways, congratulations! Raising an eldritch hivemind is a difficult but rewarding task. Properly cared for, your stowaways will provide entertainment for centuries to come. Provided here are a few tips and tricks to ensure your stowaways live healthy and fulfilling, if not necessarilylong, lives.
Comments: 15
Kudos: 99





	The Care and Keeping of Stowaways

If you find your ship in possession of stowaways, congratulations! Raising an eldritch hivemind is a difficult but rewarding task. Properly cared for, your stowaways will provide entertainment for centuries to come. Provided here are a few tips and tricks to ensure your stowaways live healthy and fulfilling, if not necessarily _long_ , lives.

**1) Ensure A Complete and Varied Diet**

Ivy walked down the corridor, remarkably confident in her steps for someone who couldn't see over the stack of documents and photo albums in her arms. Without hesitation she traced a winding pathway through the heart of the ship, following the blueprints engraved in her memory. Eventually she arrived at her destination, an abandoned cargo hold. Well, abandoned by the Mechanisms. Currently the hold served as a gathering place for stowaways of every description, sitting on every available surface, playing games, painting, singing, and doing other stowaway things. 

Stowaway things that Ivy's arrival interrupted as they scattered to the far corners, clambering over each other in their attempt to escape her notice. 

"Don't worry, I'm not here to shoot you."

A few of the braver stowaways poked their heads out of their hiding places, curiosity piqued. 

"Recent attempts to re-organize the archives have rendered these records redundant. There's a 73 percent chance that you haven't had access to these photos before." Ivy set her armful of papers on the ground. 

Her delivery made, Ivy backed away quickly as the hivemind descended on the pile. As she walked away she could just make out the cries of "Oh he's so _pretty_ " and "NASTYA ;-;" that echoed through the halls. The new information should be enough to keep them out of the way for a few weeks, at least. 

**1.5) No But Really, Feed Them**

"Fuck." 

Marius sighed, and began scraping yet another burned mess out of Brian's good skillet. This was his third attempt at di san xian today and once again it had gone poorly. As he reconstituted another aubergine, movement caught his eye in the corner of the room. There was someone watching him through the vent. Instinctively, his hand went to his gun, but something stopped him. Nastya would be pissed if he put another bullet hole in her coat so soon, and Jonny would just take the opportunity to escalate. It would be better to know who he's dealing with.

"Who's there?"

From the vent came a panicked squeak and the sound of clambering. That was... unusual. The other mechs were very much not scared of him. Clearly, whatever was in the vents was not a mechanism. 

"Hey, it's okay. You can come out, I'm not going to hurt you." Statistically unlikely, but close enough to the truth. 

Whatever was in the vent was silent for a moment, then emerged with a graceless _thunk_ onto the floor. Marius reached out a hand to help them up, and they took it, staring at him with awe. It was, quite frankly, a little bit creepy. 

"I don't believe we've had the pleasure of meeting. Baron Marius von Raum, and you are...?" 

They blinked, opened their mouth, then closed it again. After a few tries they spoke up. "We've met you before, but we probably looked a little different. Hivemind, and all. Also we think you look very nice and we're very sorry to bother you, but we smelled something cooking and couldn't help ourselves." 

"Oh." Upon further inspection, Marius was very sure he had never seen this individual before. They must be one of the stowaways Jonny had warned him about. He looked at the pile of charred potatoes and peppers that was sitting unloved in the pan. "Would you... like some?" 

Without further prompting, the stowaway scooped up the food remains and absconded back into the vents. Thoroughly unsettled, Marius decided that was enough cooking for the day. 

**2) Get Creative With Their Exercise**

The speaker crackled to life, echoing through the Aurora.

"-onny, I told you, you lost broad cast permissions-"  
"Nonsense, Nastya, I am the _captain_ \- give that back!"  
"Not until you learn to respect my girlfriend, _first mate_!"

A shot rang out, muffled over the tinny speaker system. 

"And stay dead. Now, _as I was saying,_ this is your humble captain, Jonny d'Ville, with an announcement for all stowaways. 

"It is my pleasure to announce the start of the next round of hide-or-get-shot. The rules are, as always, simple. Hide, or get shot. Start running now, because I am coming for you, and I always win. Jonny out." 

**3) Provide Secure Housing**

Ashes sighed as they surveyed the wreckage of what used to be Tim's armory. One of them, anyway. Clearly one of the less treasured ones, if the way he had casually detonated nearly a ton of STNT (space TNT) was any indication. 

It was going to take a lot of work to get it properly livable again, and the location was less than convenient. It might be time to retire it for stowaway habitat. 

Pulling out their pocket canister of gasoline, Ashes got to work. Step one: remove all identifying or otherwise incriminating evidence. Once the hivemind got hold of a piece of information, it was very difficult to contain it. Better to just torch everything and start fresh than try to clean up. 

Once the room was sufficiently cleansed, they began removing the toxic substances. Well, most of them. Gotta keep them on their toes, y'know? But a quick vacuum and gentle scrub with soap and water would take the edge off, at least. The room looked significantly better after that, and Ashes left to find some furniture. 

A few hours later they returned, dragging an oversized cat tree behind them. With Ashes came the Toy Soldier, who was carrying an old, broken, lightly singed couch, and Drumbot Brian, who had a kiddie pool and a bag full of plastic spheres of the sort you would find in a ball pit. 

They dropped the "furniture" in the middle of the room and Ashes brushed off their hands. "Good work, gang."

They Toy Soldier piped up. "Are you sure that this will be sufficient entertainment? We could leave them one of my old mandolins!" As if to demonstrate, it pulled out a mandolin and gave it an enthusiastic strum. 

Brian laughed softly and patted it on the back. "I think they'll be fine. C'mon, let's see what Aurora's up to on the bridge." 

"Tally ho, old chap!" 

The two of them walked off, leaving Ashes alone for a minute. The stowaways would move in soon, but until then they looked over their handiwork and smiled. Maybe now Jonny would stop complaining about them breaking into his belt closet to sleep. 

**4) Keep Them Away From Bad Influences**

The stowaways were getting agitated again, Raphaella could hear them from her lab. It was frankly distracting, and it needed to stop. Quickly weighing her options, Raph decided to check on them and deal with the commotion herself. She may even be able to pick up a few new test subjects. Grabbing a broom, just in case, she set off down the hallway. 

She didn't have to travel far before the problem made itself clear. There was a large gathering of stowaways all clustered around a central figure, some tired-looking goth. It was hard to make out their conversation from where Raph stood at the outskirts, but it was either about astrophysics, computer science, music, philosophy, or... Aurora's baby stories? Either way, this could not stand. 

Brandishing her broom and with wings outstretched, Raph descended on the mass, scattering the stowaways and shoo-ing away the goth. She hissed a bit, baring what appeared to be fangs, but retreated amiably into the shadows. Satisfied, Raphaella returned to her lab. 

Several months later, she awoke in a cold sweat, the realization of the agitator's identity hitting her like the rush of air out of an airlock. Surely it wasn't... it couldn't be... 

Raph shut her eyes tight and rolled over in bed, wings wrapping around herself like a cocoon. There was no way Doctor Carmilla was still on the ship, and _talking to stowaways_ of all things. It had to have been her imagination.

**Author's Note:**

> if you enjoyed this fic, go check out [this one](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25080319) by Paladog_Vyt!! it's _real_ good y'all


End file.
